The White House just released a report on big data and individual privacy, authored by a committee headed by John Podesta. It’s fascinating reading. While most of it is about governmental use of data collection and analysis (healthcare, law enforcement, anti-terrorism etc.) it may be the first high-level notice of the dangers of deep snooping, massive data collection and big data for individuals and consumers.
There has been a running thread about corporate, marketing and private data collection - often through surreptitious or indirect means, such as User Agreements that allow the provider to do anything short of raping the user’s dog - and the use of that data to target marketing at previously unheard-of (and formerly impossible) levels of accuracy. Unfortunately, this thread has largely been in the funny papers - there’s been no end of cartoons and jokes along the line of “they can snoop me all they want as long as it means I get good online coupons!” - but almost no serious discussion; even the most detailed articles and essays are focused on government efforts and set up a paragraph about consumer issues only to bat it aside.
I think it’s one thing for the government to track and build massive data files on citizens; I think it’s quite another for private companies, answerable to no one, to build even larger databases and use them only to manipulate consumer environments and actions. Maybe the Podesta report will bring this discussion into the mainstream, away from the standups and the 'tooners… and I wonder what mainstream America will think about such massive invasions of their lives just to sell them iPods.